Chapter Six: Break Away

It hurts her.

It eats away at her soul.

It poisons her every breath.

Waterbending.

Her body calls for it.

She must learn it.

She must.

Or she will be torn apart.

She trembles in her fury. To think, the very people she loves will be people who destroy her. To think, her own family will never understand. To think, the stranger whom she found in an iceberg will be the ticket to her destiny.

"Please." His words ring with an anguish she cannot comprehend. "You don't know what it's like to be without your family."

She shakes her head, and her hair loopies shake with it, yet another reminder of her life, but one she will not give up.

"I do understand, and I'm willing to—to make a wish—take a chance—make a change. Please. I need to . . . I need to break away."

He is so far from her, sitting atop his sky bison, watching her from the air. He understands her. Why can't the others—her own brother—her own gran-gran—her own village . . . Why must she suffer from their ignorance? Why can't they understand? Why? Why? Why?

Because, says the voice in her head, he is a bender, like you. An Airbender. And something . . . something else.

He shifts in his seat, and she tracks his movements. She steps back in time for him to gently land, a current billowing. He shivers; she realizes he is cold. His hand rests on her shoulder, but she can only feel the pressure, not the warmth, through the layers of her coat.

Her very traditional Southern Water Tribe coat.

The traditions are smothering her. She has to leave. She has to break away. She has to go, to move, to breathe, to swim, to live.

She can feel the pressure of the outside world.

But not the warmth.

"You do," he admits quietly, his voice carrying the barest hint of worlds she has never dreamed of, much less seen. "You do need to break away. But not today, and not with me."